We are approaching a decade since the major conference realignment recast college football and helped to usher in the playoff era of today. The topic of further expansion or contraction of conference ebbs and flows over the years but has mostly remained a dormant discussion outside of a rare treatise on the future of Texas football or the changes coming soon in the Player Movement era.

Recently, across the Atlantic Ocean a bombshell report from Sky Sports wrote that a new European Premier League in soccer could be formed and begin play in just a few years from now. To spare you the details, basically the top club soccer teams from the Big 5 countries (England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany) would form a 16 or 18-team super league to increase their share of wealth and power over the sport. It likely won’t happen anytime soon–as it’s largely a leverage move within their own countries–but it’s a fun (or maybe depressing!) scenario to think about.

What if the biggest programs in college football attempted something similar in the future here in America? Could it be done?

On the surface, it would seem near impossible for college football. The soccer clubs in Europe would plan on creating a new league–but the crucial difference being–they would still compete in their own domestic leagues, too. The large increase in games for soccer is a stumbling block for the sport but theoretically it’s possible for them to work out some compromise or decrease the size of a new league.

It’s difficult to believe you could ever convince Alabama to not compete in the SEC or for Ohio State not to compete in the Big Ten. In college football, you couldn’t play in 2 league simultaneously. Setting aside the mountain of contracts to negotiate from out under, this is probably a no-go for programs who truly feel their regional hegemony is paramount.

Be that as it may, let’s pretend it could happen. Who should make it in the College Football Premier League? Using a combination of historical prestige and modern program value we have several no-brainers:

*Ohio State
*Michigan
*Alabama
*Georgia
*LSU
*Florida
*Oklahoma
*Texas
*USC
*Notre Dame
*Florida State
*Clemson

This is 12 teams and I don’t think anyone could argue excluding anyone* from that group. Ten years ago it would be nearly unthinkable to include Clemson but averaging about 13 wins a year with 2 National Championships since has its perks.

*Okay, maybe this group is a little more controversial than I thought and needs further some skepticism. It includes 18 out of the last 19 National Champions and 20 out of the last 22 champs. Only Georgia, Notre Dame, and Michigan haven’t won a title in that time frame. UM has 2 major bowl wins since 1999, Georgia has 4 major bowl wins, and while Notre Dame has zero such trophies we’ve been far more consistently better than Michigan (who would likely be the one team above not to make it but honestly Ohio State would insist on it just so they can keep beating them). 

Here are the other teams to consider:

2020 Program Value per Forbes

1 Texas A&M
2 Auburn
3 Tennessee
4 Penn State
5 Oregon
6 Washington
7 Nebraska
8 Wisconsin
9 Miami

All-Time Winning Percentage

1 Nebraska
2 Penn State
3 Tennessee
4 Miami
5 Auburn
6 Washington
7 Texas A&M
8 Wisconsin
9 Oregon

Winning Percentage Since 2000

1 Oregon
2 Wisconsin
3 Auburn
4 Miami
5 Penn State
6 Nebraska
7 Texas A&M
8 Tennessee
9 Washington

Before I go any further, I have to decide how large I want this new league to be. Let’s proceed with a 16-team league because it’s the most fun. That means, we can only pick 4 teams from the above list.

We’ll cross off the following effective immediately: Tennessee, Nebraska, and Washington.

Obviously, a tough call for programs who have a rich history and won at least one National Title in the 1990’s which isn’t that long ago. Still, the Vols and Cornhuskers haven’t been nearly good enough in recent times to be included. Tennessee hasn’t won their division since 2007 and hasn’t finished in the top 10 since 2001. Nebraska hasn’t won 11 games since 2001 and hasn’t won a conference title since 1999.

Washington is a little tougher to cross off for a couple reasons. One, we’d like more presence from the west coast. Two, they were so, so bad for most of this century but have been one of the best teams in the Pac-12 for the past 7 years and won conference titles twice in recent years. They’d feel hard done by and I understand.

The last 4 spots I am giving to: Auburn, Oregon, Penn State and Miami. The 16-team College Football Premier League would now include all of the champions over the last 22 years.

Unfortunately, Texas A&M is the big money-maker who loses out but I don’t think we need another SEC/Southern team to the mix. I’m sure Wisconsin would feel appalled by this decision due to their recent success over the past couple decades. But, they are like Texas A&M in that we don’t need another team from the Big Ten, plus they don’t make nearly enough money.

***

Set in Stone?

Following the formation of the College Football Premier League the old conferences will have to be modified.

ACC – Boston College, Duke, Georgia Tech, Louisville, North Carolina, NC State, Pitt, Syracuse, Virginia Tech, Virginia, and Wake Forest PLUS new 12th member Appalachian State

Big Ten – Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue, Rutgers, and Wisconsin PLUS new 12th member Cincinnati.

Big 12 – Baylor, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas Tech and West Virginia PLUS new members (4): Houston, SMU, Louisiana, and Marshall.

Pac-12 – Arizona, Arizona State, California, Colorado, Oregon State, Stanford, UCLA, Utah, Washington, and Washington State PLUS new members (2): Boise State and BYU.

SEC – Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Missouri, Ole Miss, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas A&M, and Vanderbilt PLUS new members (3): UCF, USF, and Memphis.

3 Questions

1) Would Notre Dame actually join the College Football Premier League?

Let’s start here. If news broke tomorrow that somehow an alliance of Ohio State/Michigan/Alabama/Auburn/Texas/Oklahoma were interested in forming a new super league and were ready to invite 10 more teams, would Notre Dame join without hesitation?

I’m thinking yes, and it wouldn’t be a terribly difficult decision from Notre Dame leaders. It would mean effectively ending over a 100 years of independence, losing the NBC television contract, and killing rivalries like Navy but it would be a trigger to pull in order to compete at the highest level and not be shut out of that exclusive club.

2) Does a new conference form between FBS and FCS?

It would probably make sense for the remaining Power 5 conferences to separate themselves from the current Group of 5 conferences in this new system. Some of those conferences would be really weakened in this new set up. The AAC would be without Cincinnati, Houston, SMU, UCF, USF, and Memphis which leaves the best teams like Navy and Tulsa.

Conference USA would lose Marshall, the Mountain West would lose Boise State, while the Sun Belt would lose Louisiana and App State. Only the MAC would be left untouched.

It would make sense for 11 new teams to move up the FBS Group of 5 level. Maybe these ones: Delaware, Eastern Washington, Idaho, Illinois State, Jacksonville State, James Madison, Montana, North Dakota State, Richmond, Sam Houston State, and Youngstown State.

3) Relegation: Yes or no?

A new European premier league in soccer will ultimately deal with this should it come to pass: Do they welcome new teams into their pact? In the relegation crazy nature of European soccer it’s far easier (the clubs have proposed a relegation of some sort every 10 years, as one possibility, which is crazy in its own right) to pull off and would throw a bone to some seriously legendary clubs who would be shut out initially.

As fantastical of an idea as this is for college football, it’s difficult to imagine a relegation model being implemented even though competitively speaking it probably should. Some day if a super league is formed it’ll be too bad for the teams that don’t get invited but it would be cool to see the likes of A&M, Wisconsin, and others with the ability to make it in each year if they qualified.

The biggest obstacle is the conferences themselves. You could have the champion of the Power 5 playoff promoted to the Premier League but when Michigan finishes in last place do they go back to the Big Ten? And what if Michigan sucks so bad they get relegated to the Group of 5? Which conference do they play in then? Same issues apply for teams getting promoted–they’d be leaving a conference and not necessarily being replaced by a team that was in their conference. Plus, how do you figure out who the relegated teams are in a system with 5 huge conferences?

You’d almost have to break up the Power 5 and Group of 5 into half a dozen smaller leagues to make it work. Or, just don’t do relegation and the Premier League of College Football is set in stone forever.